• Take this to the bank: the next outdoor game on New Year’s Day 2010 will be at the brand new Yankee Stadium with the New York Rangers on the bill.

If the league’s smart, they will get Alex Ovechkin and the Washington Capitals as the other headliners. It might be an idea for NBC and the curious audience in the U.S. to lobby for the game’s most exciting player, don’t you think?

“You never see him on Versus (U.S. once a week) or not very often on Hockey Night in Canada. That’s unfortunate,” said Dallas Stars’ Mike Modano, who’s a big fan.

• Sources say Crosby misses Ryan Malone and Jarkko Ruuttu to look after the talking in the Pittsburgh room while he leads on the ice, and he’s more upset about the Penguins not signing Marian Hossa than he’s letting on.

• Sergei Zubov’s hip surgery scuttles any plans Bob Gainey had of maybe trying to get the defenceman at the trade deadline from his old employers, the Dallas Stars, to work the point. Gainey’s plan B might be Scott Niedermayer, who’s on the last year of his contract in Anaheim, but that would mean the Ducks are in sell-off mode.

One of the real great guys to come out of the Wing farm system had himself a game last night for Buffalo. Number 1 star, according to Ross McKeon at Puck Daddy.

No. 1 star, Matt Ellis, Buffalo Sabres:
Matt Ellis has played less than 100 career games, but none will probably stand out as much as Saturday’s contest in Boston. Ellis scored two goals to help the Buffalo Sabres snap the Bruins’ 10-game winning streak and hand the hosts their first loss at home since the first month of the season. Ellis, who was in training camp with the Los Angeles Kings before getting claimed off waivers by Buffalo just before the start of the season, was recently recalled from the minors. Ellis scored the game’s first goal 3:20 after the opening faceoff, added his second 3:04 into the second period and chipped in an assist for a three-point game on Buffalo’s final goal. Ellis, a plus-3 with three shots a faceoff win, did all of his damage in only 9:51 of ice time.

In case you’d forgotten young Matthew, here was our reaction when he passed through waivers back in February, ‘08.

A great game to watch could be Calgary vs. Chicago. The Flames will be shooting for their sixth straight win while Chicago tries to end a two game losing streak. The Calgary Herald looks at the matchup.

“It’s time for us to start playing with a little smack, we played well, we competed, we battled. It was the most complete team game we’ve had in a while. It’s something we can enjoy tonight before we get moving forward.”

-Sabres goaltender Ryan Miller after defeating the Boston Bruins yesterday. More on the Sabres from Bucky Gleason of the Buffalo News.

Or Gags. Or Struds. Or Cogs. Or any of the Edmonton Oilers who are obviously more imaginative on the ice than off it.

“You have to earn nicknames. You can’t just come in and say, ‘I want to be called Hercules,’ ” said Jason Strudwick, better known as Struds to his teammates and coaches.

So, what of Horc and Roli, if that is the sole criteria? They have been around longer than Pens and Storts but still haven’t been given punchier handles, which is something most of the players need, particularly Marc Pouliot.

Way too much talent in that Penguins lineup for them to struggle so mightily on the power play, in part why they called a players-only meeting after the Bruins rubbed them out at the Igloo Dec. 30. Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin are among the two best young forwards in the game, and they can’t get the job done on the power play? Clearly, they miss Sergei Gonchar (shoulder), who has been out all year. But some of it is coaching, and Michel Therrien has always been a bit of a strange fit there, even when they made their run to the Cup finals last spring.

“This should have been a game you jump into with both feet and scratch and claw with everything you have,” Tippett said of a battle against the slumping Oilers. “But in the first 10 minutes, we played on the fringes, we gave up two bad goals, we made mistakes in our own end, and that’s not the way to start a game like this.”

“The most disheartening thing is this was pretty much a playoff game, and we didn’t play like it was,” said forward Steve Ott. “They came out like it was a playoff game, and we didn’t. We have to realize that these are four point games, and we’re not the ones getting the four points.”

Alexander Semin engaged in his first career fight tonight with Rangers defenseman Marc Staal, who had two small scratches under his right eye after the encounter. And for those of you who weren’t watching the game, check out the first video. Descriptions of Semin’s punches toward the end of the fight ranged from him playing the bongos to him looking like Energizer Bunny beating a drum….

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